Geologists have discovered three previously unrecorded volcanoes in volcanically active southeast Australia. The new Monash University research, published in the Australian Journal of Earth Sciences, gives a detailed picture of an area of volcanic centres already known to geologists in the region. Covering an area of 19,000 square kilometres in Victoria and South Australia, with over 400 volcanoes, the Newer Volcanics Province (NVP) features the youngest volcanoes in Australia including Mount Schank and Mount Gambier. Focusing on the Hamilton region, lead researcher ...

VIDEO: Two oil drops, covered with particles of different properties, coalesce due to the action of an alternating electric field, forming a Janus capsule. Click here for more information. Everything depends on how you look at them. Looking from one side you will see one face; and when looking from the opposite side – you will see a different one. So appear Janus capsules, miniature, hollow structures, in different fragments composed of different micro- and nanoparticles. Theoreticians ...

Remember those molecule models made from sticks and balls you could assemble to study complex molecules back in school? Something similar has taken shape in the Interactive Geometry Lab at ETH Zurich. ETH-professor Olga Sorkine-Hornung and her team do not study molecules but ways to manipulate virtual shapes, like animated characters on a computer screen. Now they have developed an input device or "joystick" to move and pose virtual characters, made up – similar to the molecule models – of modular building blocks. An artist can assemble these blocks into an approximate ...

In a new study, researchers from Imperial College Business School, Columbia University and the University of Maryland found that wealthy individuals in the US can get in relative terms up to 70 per cent times greater returns on their investments than those with modest wealth, when the yields on assets such as stocks and bonds are calculated. The team say that this further widens the income gap between rich and poor and potentially creates disparities in society. Income inequality in the US has been steadily rising. According to a report by Oxfam International released ...

The Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG, German Research Foundation) and the German National Academy of Sciences Leopoldina presented their joint recommendations on "Scientific Freedom and Scientific Responsibility" on 26 June 2014 in Berlin. Attended by representatives from the media, the Professors Jörg Hacker and Peter Strohschneider, Presidents of the Leopoldina and the DFG respectively, presented recommendations for handling security-relevant research, placing the subject against the background of the current political debate. With the publication the research organisations ...

This news release is available in German. Over 150 million people throughout the world suffer from chronic infection with the hepatitis C virus (HCV), which causes massive damage to the liver. Advanced liver diseases often necessitate liver transplants. In the new clinical study Dr. Felix Bohne and his colleagues studied together with Prof. Alberto Sánchez-Fueyo from King's College London 34 hepatitis C patients at the Liver Unit of the University Hospital Clínic de Barcelona who had received new livers. The researchers had two objectives here: first, they wanted ...

COLUMBIA, Mo. – The evolution of language in humans continues to perplex scientists and linguists who study how humans learn to communicate. Considered by some as "operant learning," this multi-tiered trait involves many genes and modification of an individual's behavior by trial and error. Toddlers acquire communication skills by babbling until what they utter is rewarded; however, the genes involved in learning language skills are far from completely understood. Now, using a gene identified in fruit flies by a University of Missouri researcher, scientists involved in ...

(SALT LAKE CITY)—Patients who have post-operative complications following high-risk surgery have a significantly lower risk of being readmitted to the hospital within 30 days if they go see their primary care physician soon following discharge, a new study in JAMA Surgery shows. The study shows that better coordination of care between surgeons and primary care physicians is important to help reduce hospital readmissions within 30 days for those high-risk surgery patients who have post-operative complications or live with a chronic disease, according to Benjamin S. Brooke, ...

Chlorinated chemicals perform a host of societally useful functions, but they also have a dark side. Once their use life has ended, such agents often become environmental contaminants, sometimes resistant to bioremediation. In a series of new studies, Anca Delgado, a researcher at Arizona State University's Biodesign Institute, examines unique groups of microorganisms, capable of converting hazardous chlorinated chemicals like trichloroetheene (TCE) into ethene, a benign end product of microbial biodegradation. The research was conducted as part of her doctorate work ...

ARLINGTON HEIGHTS, Ill. (June 26, 2014) – It's tough being the parent of a child with food allergies. Constant vigilance is needed for everything your child eats, when a single food item containing a hidden ingredient can be fatal. Although worry is a factor for anyone caring for a child with food allergies, according to a study published in the July issue of Annals of Allergy, Asthma and Immunology, the scientific publication of the American College of Allergy, Asthma and Immunology (ACAAI), there is increased anxiety and strain for caregivers of children allergic to milk ...

Old World monkeys have undergone a remarkable evolution in facial appearance as a way of avoiding interbreeding with closely related and geographically proximate species, researchers from New York University and the University of Exeter have found. Their research provides the best evidence to date for the role of visual cues as a barrier to breeding across species. "Evolution produces adaptations that help animals thrive in a particular environment, and over time these adaptations lead to the evolution of new species," explains James Higham, an assistant professor in ...

Green-chemistry researchers at McGill University have discovered a way to use water as a solvent in one of the reactions most widely used to synthesize chemical products and pharmaceuticals. The findings, published June 26 in Nature Communications, mark a potential milestone in efforts to develop organic reactions in water. Chao-Jun Li and Feng Zhou of McGill's Department of Chemistry report that they have discovered a catalytic system which for the first time allows direct metal-mediated reactions between aryl halides and carbonyl compounds in water. For the past ...

TORONTO, June 26, 2014—Tuberculosis infection among people taking corticosteroid pills may be underestimated, new research suggests. Current guidelines for what constitutes a positive TB skin test among corticosteroid pill users may not be capturing all those who are infected, said Dr. Nicholas Vozoris, a respirologist in the Tuberculosis Program at St. Michael's Hospital. Previous research has shown that people who take corticosteroid pills, such as Prednisone, and have inhaled the TB bacteria, have an eight times higher risk of the bacteria becoming active than people ...

TORONTO, June 26, 2014 – Women with chronic physical illnesses are more likely to use mental health services than men with similar illnesses; they also seek out mental health services six months earlier than those same men, according to new study from St. Michael's Hospital and the Institute for Clinical Evaluative Sciences (ICES). "Chronic physical illness can lead to depression," said Dr. Flora Matheson, a scientist in the hospital's Centre for Research on Inner City Health. "We want to better understand who will seek mental health services when diagnosed with a chronic ...

PHILADELPHIA — The longer a person took low-dose aspirin, the lower his or her risk for developing pancreatic cancer, according to a study published in Cancer Epidemiology, Biomarkers & Prevention, a journal of the American Association for Cancer Research. "We found that the use of low-dose aspirin was associated with cutting the risk of pancreatic cancer in half, with some evidence that the longer low-dose aspirin was used, the lower the risk," said Harvey A. Risch, MD, PhD, professor of epidemiology in the Department of Chronic Disease Epidemiology at the Yale School ...

Current guidelines to help prevent bloodstream infections during intravenous feeding may need revisions to strengthen protections for patients, a new study finds. Researchers at the United Kingdom's University of Southampton found that current guidelines do not account for other independent factors that can affect the growth of potentially deadly microorganisms. Their study was published today in the OnlineFirst version of the Journal of Parenteral and Enteral Nutrition (JPEN), the research journal of the American Society for Parenteral and Enteral Nutrition (A.S.P.E.N.). ...

On the heels of the 2014 hurricane season, researchers are calling for home parenteral and enteral nutrition (HPEN) consumers and their homecare providers to have a comprehensive emergency preparedness plan (EPP) to ensure that special needs are met during the time of a disaster. In a paper published today in the American Society for Parenteral and Enteral Nutrition's (A.S.P.E.N.) Nutrition in Clinical Practice journal, researchers with Coram Specialty Infusion Services outline the experiences of HPEN consumers and homecare providers in New Jersey affected by Hurricane ...

COLLEGE STATION – Scientists with Texas A&M AgriLife Research have found a "Trojan horse" way to deliver proteins into live human cells without damaging them. The finding, published in this month's Nature Methods, is expected to be easily adopted for use in medical research to find cures and treatments for a wide range of diseases, according to the team's lead scientist, Dr. Jean-Philippe Pellois, an associate professor of biochemistry at Texas A&M University. "This is something that for many years people have tried to do, because proteins are basic components of the ...

Watersnakes, commonly seen in the lakes, rivers and streams of the eastern United States, are invading California waterways and may pose a threat to native and endangered species in the state, according to a University of California, Davis, study. While scientists do not know exactly how many watersnakes are in California, roughly 300 individuals of two different species –the common watersnake and the southern watersnake -- have been found in the Sacramento area (Roseville and Folsom), and at least 150 were seen in Long Beach. Researchers suspect the nonvenomous snakes ...

Genomic sequencing is supposed to reveal the entire genetic makeup of an organism. For infectious disease specialists, the technology can be used to analyze a disease-causing bacterium to determine how much harm it is capable of causing and whether or not it will be resistant to antibiotics. But new research at Rockefeller University suggests that current sequencing protocols overlook crucial bits of information: isolated pieces of DNA floating outside the bacterial chromosome, the core of a cell's genetic material. "Extensive sequencing of chromosomal DNA has been performed ...

Fossil fuel emissions release billions of tons of carbon into the atmosphere each year, which is changing the climate and threatening the sustainability of life on planet Earth. In Brazil, the demand for alternative energy sources has led to an increase in biofuel crops. A new "News and Views" paper in Nature Climate Change, co-authored by Woods Hole Research Center scientists Marcia Macedo and Eric Davidson, reviews new research conducted by Brazilian colleagues demonstrating the high carbon costs of converting intact Brazilian savanna compared to the carbon gains obtained ...

VIDEO: Francisco Raymo discusses his work in this video. Click here for more information. CORAL GABLES, Fla. (June 25, 2014) — With the continuing need for very small devices in therapeutic applications, there is a growing demand for the development of nanoparticles that can transport and deliver drugs to target cells in the human body. Recently, researchers created nanoparticles that under the right conditions, self-assemble – trapping complementary guest molecules within ...

Surrounding the sun is a vast atmosphere of solar particles, through which magnetic fields swarm, solar flares erupt, and gigantic columns of material rise, fall and jostle each other around. Now, using NASA's Solar Terrestrial Relations Observatory, scientists have found that this atmosphere, called the corona, is even larger than thought, extending out some 5 million miles above the sun's surface -- the equivalent of 12 solar radii. This information has implications for NASA's upcoming Solar Probe Plus mission, due to launch in 2018 and go closer to the sun than any man-made ...

Space may appear empty -- a soundless vacuum, but it's not an absolute void. It flows with electric activity that is not visible to our eyes. NASA is developing plans to send humans to an asteroid, and wants to know more about the electrical environment explorers will encounter there. A solar wind blown from the surface of the sun at about a million miles per hour flows around all solar system objects, forming swirling eddies and vortices in its wake. Magnetic fields carried by the solar wind warp, twist, and snap as they slam into the magnetic fields around other objects ...

Cambridge, Mass. – June 25, 2014 – In wind farms across North America and Europe, sleek turbines equipped with state-of-the-art technology convert wind energy into electric power. But tucked inside the blades of these feats of modern engineering is a decidedly low-tech core material: balsa wood. Like other manufactured products that use sandwich panel construction to achieve a combination of light weight and strength, turbine blades contain carefully arrayed strips of balsa wood from Ecuador, which provides 95 percent of the world's supply. For centuries, the fast-growing ...